


Retrouvailles

by RoLo_Renegade



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Also I'm soft for Supercat, And just plain scared of Cat, Angst with a Happy Ending, Because Cat Grant, Because of the nature of the story, Because that's what Christmas is all about Charlie Brown, But definitely angst, F/F, There is some loss, We have a happy ending, and snark, but i promise, maybe some fluff, supercat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-25
Updated: 2020-01-29
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:01:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21879292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoLo_Renegade/pseuds/RoLo_Renegade
Summary: An unexpected alien attack has repercussions more far-reaching than anyone in National City ever expected--especially Cat Grant.
Relationships: Kara Danvers/Cat Grant
Comments: 101
Kudos: 409
Collections: Super Santa Femslash 2019





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [badwolfkaily](https://archiveofourown.org/users/badwolfkaily/gifts).



> Inspired a little bit by both your prompts! It focuses heavily on "Cat Grant awakens in a future where the only person she knows that's alive is Kara Danvers. She has to adapt to her new life." But there's also definitely some flavor from your second prompt as well: "Cat Grant gets kidnapped or hurt after her and Kara have a fight (either established relationship or not) and Kara saves her." No fighting, but I definitely borrowed some hurt Cat and hero Kara from this idea ;-)

The alien arrived on a bright Thursday morning that beckoned to Kara as she soared through sunlight and skimmed across currents that curled her cape into a crimson contrail. Knowing her sister was enjoying some quality fly time after a hellish battle the previous evening, Alex dispatched a drone to identify what had just splashed down far enough off the coast that only those trained to monitor the skies for such arrivals would even notice. The normal tension of uncertainty hummed between the sharp jut of her shoulder blades.

The alien reached National City’s shore that same Thursday morning, mere minutes after destroying the drone with the swipe of its massive talons. As it dragged its hulking mass up from the harbor, scales dripping and glinting in the morning light, Alex was already on her way to the scene with two teams of agents. Still, she refrained from contacting Kara, hoping this was something the DEO could handle without having to ruin her sister’s much needed respite from her Super duties.

She would see her regret for that decision reflected in her sister’s broken gaze for the rest of her life.

The alien slithered swiftly through the streets of National City, leading the agents on a pursuit that left them constantly outpaced and uncertain as to its ultimate destination. Only when it caught something in the wind did it slow its pace but also sharpen its focus, steering its massive reptilian frame deep into the heart of the business district.

The sound of Alex’s voice through her earpiece was barely a forewarning, the alien rounding into sight at the same second Kara heard her sister call frantically for her assistance. She remained stationary, however, hovering outside the office whose occupant always drew her in with magnetic predictability whenever she soared by on patrols.

Positioning herself at the edge of the office’s balcony, she called over her shoulder, “You need to go back inside, Ms. Grant.”

She rotated in midair as she spoke, tracking the unnervingly swift movements of the alien as it barreled down the center of the road beneath them before launching itself a good fifty feet into the air and sinking its talons into the side of the building opposite CatCo.

“What in the hell is _that_?”

Cat’s voice, right behind her now instead of farther away, zigzagged along her spine like lightning. Unwilling to look away from the alien’s persistent approach, she growled over her shoulder, “Cat, please get inside!”

The alien had already scaled three quarters of the building, the muscles of its long tail pushing against the windows and concrete to shove its body up the side of the structure with alarming speed. Its talons pierced the structure like hot lances through ice as it dragged itself rapidly higher. Kara was certain she could feel each strike tremor through the air around her.

Finally reaching a height slightly above where the hero hovered, the alien pulled its body tightly against the building before shoving away, its force like the tsunami tide curling away from the shore before reversing and slamming its destructive strength against the land. As it soared across the chasm between buildings, it curled into itself, a thick line of quills releasing along the ridges of its spine as it did.

The hero inhaled sharply at the sight, fighting back whatever instinct warned her to run away and instead flying to meet the alien mid-air.

“Kara, no!”

She heard the stereophonic plea, from behind her and from her earpiece, and she nearly laughed at the unexpected confirmation Cat’s command carried with it—because, of course, Cat Grant _knew_.

After this was over, she told herself, they would laugh together.

Her minor distraction was enough for her to miss the way the quills quivered right before they _launched_ from the alien’s spine. Several struck her with varying degrees of pain registering through her impenetrable flesh with unsettling surprise.

The truest pain, however, was from the quill that completely missed her.

The cry of Kara’s anguish was a palpable, terrifying sound Alex was certain she would never be able to erase from her memory. Looking up, she watched her sister spin and grab the alien from the sky as it continued its trajectory toward her and fly it straight down toward the ground, oblivious to anyone else around her.

“Supergirl! Stop!”

Warning ignored, she continued on an unstoppable path that sent bystanders scrambling from their vehicles and off the sidewalks as quickly as they could manage. The impact rumbled outward in a dangerous explosion of debris as Kara buried her attacker deep into the crater they made. Still, those at the surface could hear and feel her continued journey down through the levels of strata.

Running as quickly as she could among chunks of displaced asphalt and still-spinning vehicles, Alex climbed all the way to the edge of the hole.

“Supergirl, please respond. What’s your status?”

The air within the crater rippled upward with such force, Alex and the other DEO agents with her blew back from the edge as Kara ascended once more toward the top of CatCo Tower. Though she refused to respond to Alex’s calls, her sister could hear the frantic pleading mantra spilling from her lips as she returned to the balcony far above.

Boots touched down, but Kara’s legs shook beneath her so violently, she thought she might continue downward until she hit her knees. Only Cat’s agonized gaze fixed on her every move kept her from completely falling—and completely falling apart.

A large quill pierced through Cat’s right thigh, front to back, forcing her to sprawl across the balcony deck on her left side, her nails shattered and split from the way she clawed against the concrete beneath her.

Pain vibrated through her body and she could barely make out the softly chanted mantra of foreign words Kara whispered beneath the booming bass tempo of her heart beating inside her head.

Eyelids suddenly too difficult a struggle to lift, she sank into darkness that was anything but peaceful. A riot of sound rose from within her office, trampling out onto the balcony with hard-soled insistence.

“Alex, please.”

Kara’s voice broke beneath the weight of her two-word plea, but not even her hero’s panic could keep her rooted in consciousness. Perhaps it was for the best, she mused, as she let herself freefall away from the searing sensations she could feel coursing through her veins.

Waves of awareness churned and crashed around her, dragging her through conversations comprising shouted orders, mostly from a faintly familiar voice—but never the one voice she needed to hear above all others. That voice, she knew, meant safety, meant refuge—meant so much more than she ever found the courage to acknowledge.

Only when she did finally hear it again, it meant something she wasn’t prepared to accept: Defeat. Fear. Heartbreak.

The words filtered through her without making any true impression, but the soft press of lips against her forehead was what remained foremost in her thoughts until the moment nothingness flooded through her and she sank deep within its tow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy holidays! I really enjoyed both your prompts, and for some odd reason, my brain just decided to mix them up together. Hopefully, it's a mix you enjoy :-)
> 
> Oh, and the title means "The happiness of meeting again after a long time."


	2. Chapter 2

Winds tangled around him, demanding entrance into the vast emptiness into which he stumbled thanks to the force of their icy press. With a frustrated growl and one massive shove, he righted himself and returned the door to its locked position, stamping his boots to knock the snow out of his treads. Absently brushing away the ice clinging to his parka, he flipped back his hood and strode more deeply into the fortress’s main hall.

The soft vibration of the approaching service bot drew his attention as he set down his case and stripped away his outerwear.

“Kelex, good to see you’re still up and running.”

The bot hovered to a halt several feet in front of him, bowing his body forward in an odd simulation of deference. “Since I remain in standby when no one is here to require my assistance, I suspect I will remain fully functional for an indefinite amount of time.”

A low murmur rumbled in his chest. “She hasn’t been back since my last visit?”

“Lady Kara has made it quite clear she has never liked visiting here, even less so since that day.”

As he slung his coat over his arm and retrieved his case, he replied, “Well, prepare yourself—and the fortress, Kelex. If all goes well, Lady Kara will be coming back today.”

Listening long enough to hear Kelex floating into place behind him, he continued, “Activate the lab systems. I’m going to need to work in there for a little while. Also, set up the projector. I believe we’re going to be using it before this day is over.”

He caught the service bot’s confirmation and the sound of it hovering off to tend to his orders. Continuing on through the great hall, he passed into the corridor that led to, among other rooms, the lab Kal-El had created long ago. He entered into the facility with a pleased nod, seeing everything intact and ready for his use.

Popping open the case he’d brought with him, he set up his equipment and began running his equations through the fortress’s system for one final check before setting the equipment to work on replicating the formula that would finally bring _her_ home.

Not willing to dwell too long on the end goal, he instead settled in and began through the long checklist ahead of him. Still, however, he couldn’t help but feel the conjuring of something he’d thought long ago silenced within him: Hope.

The years after the initial attack, which had been so catastrophic and unmerciful, all any of them could do was stay vigilant and try to keep far enough ahead of the ensuing onslaught to make it to the next day. Survival alone, however, was an unsatisfactory substitute for the victory they all craved—an elusive creature that took far too long, and far too great a toll, to finally capture.

In many ways, he couldn’t help but think she had been the luckiest of them all, having been hit and infected before anyone else had any idea what was coming. While the years flowed into decades into far more than most could even outlast, she had remained in a state of stasis that both protected and condemned her—until now.

The sound of the lab’s system completing its analysis roused him from his reverie. On the screen before him, he saw the confirmation he thought might never come: complete reversal of the viral infection that had triggered a rapid septic response in humans pierced by the poisonous quills of their attackers.

Satisfied with the confirmation, he proceeded to unload the rest of his case and set about the long task of generating the vaccine. Pulling up all the knowledge he’d cobbled together from his various teachers through the years, starting all the way back with Alex and Eliza, he moved carefully and methodically through the process he had only to that point practiced virtually.

Hours later, he stared down at the final product of his labor: the cure (he hoped) to the Jarondu’u virus.

“Kelex!”

His voice echoed down the corridor as he stretched his weary muscles and waited for the service bot to return.

When the familiar form hovered into sight, awaiting instruction, he ordered, “Activate the projector. It’s time.”


	3. Chapter 3

“Well, this puts a new spin on ‘wardrobe malfunction,’ doesn’t it?”

She felt the creases forming along her forehead in ways she knew were ruining her latest moisturizing treatment from Lisle. The sight of what she was certain was dried blood speckling the bodice of her dress, however, seemed a satisfactory enough reason to need to revisit her esthetician sooner than normal.

Touching her fingers to the stiff, ragged edges of the hole in the material that should have covered her thigh, she felt her muscles strain against the memory of the quill she was certain should have still been there. At the very least, she knew the skin beneath her fingertips should have been just as torn and bloodied as her dress now was.

“I apologize, Ms. Grant. I can’t imagine how jarring all this must be.”

He startled at the way her gaze instantly tracked upward from her lap, ensnaring him in her coldest glare.

“I don’t know who the hell you are, but congratulations on your expert grasp of _understating_ the obvious.”

The face before her frowned—and then morphed, drawing out a shocked gasp ahead of the scathing follow-up that had been poised to flow.

When finished, the youthful and wholly unfamiliar features had transformed into a face peripherally recognizable.

“Agent Mulder.”

His responding laughter seemed to surprise him even more than her. Something in the oddly dismissive acknowledgement, however, awoke memories of times long lost but still so vivid.

“I believe I told you my name was Monroe.”

Her eyes rolled beneath the flutter of her eyelids. “Yes. And my fictional name for you was more amusing than your own. Now, why don’t you tell me your real name?”

His lips pressed together to hide his smile. “My real name is J’onn.”

An acknowledging nod was all she offered before switching into her next line of questioning. “Well, J’onn, we can get to how often you change faces and names after you explain to me why I’m freezing my ass off inside this carnival ride car while wearing the zombified version of my favorite Alexander McQueen.”

His mood sobered quickly. “You’re actually inside a Kryptonian pod.”

Seeing the golden shards of her eyes alight inquisitively, he explained, “We needed to get you into stasis as quickly as possible.”

“And you couldn’t find something else a little less _punctured_ for me to wear beforehand?”

His expression snuffed some of her natural fire. “Placing you into stasis was a hastily made decision that didn’t really allow for wardrobe changes.”

With a distracted flick of her fingers, she sighed, “What about now? Surely, there’s something available for me to wear other than this fashion abomination.”

As if predicting her request, he pulled a set of clothes from the pack he’d brought with him. “You actually might want to change into that now before continuing your interrogation. We don’t have much time.”

“Much time for what?”

Rather than respond, J’onn extended a hand to help her out of the pod’s seat.

She climbed out carefully, faltering noticeably in her attempt to stand on her own. Keeping his hands wrapped around her biceps, he soothed, “It’s all right, Ms. Grant. It’s been a while since you last stood. Plus, I just repaired the damage to your leg moments before releasing you from stasis.”

Cat shivered once more at the phantom piercing sensations through her thigh. “You mean from that porcupine Kaiju that turned me into shish kabob?”

Snorting his approval of her quip, he placed the clothes in her hands and stepped back so he could turn away. “Please. I can continue to answer your questions while you change.”

He caught the calculating squint of Cat’s gaze before he turned his back completely toward her. When he heard the telling rustle of her following his instruction, he exhaled softly in relief.

“So, what actually attacked us?”

“The alien you remember was a Xeltari. We thought at first they were the invaders. Turned out, they were the _weapon_.”

He caught the surprised huff right before fingers curled around his shoulder. Turning, he nodded in relief at the sight of Cat wearing the provided clothes. He also noted how much tinier she appeared in just her socked feet.

Her expression grew dangerously perceptive as she dangled her discarded heels from her fingers. “Valentino Garavanis go with a lot of different styles, but I have to draw a line at cargo pants and flannel.”

Pulling a pair of boots from his pack next, he moved closer so she could grip his shoulder once more for balance. As she slipped them on, she asked, “So if the Xeltari were the weapon, who wielded them?”

He hummed, impressed by the way her journalistic curiosity activated so swiftly. “A race called the Jarondu’u. They send the Xeltari in waves to planets they wish to conquer. You witnessed the scout detail. The Jarondu’u had studied us long enough to identify our strongest defenses. They then sent Xeltari scouts to attack each of Earth’s known heroes. Some were successful on first strike. Some merely gathered data they transmitted back to the Jarondu’u so they could program the next Xeltari detail to be more lethal.”

Cat released her grip and leaned back against the side of the pod. “Programmed?”

“The Xeltari are clones the Jarondu’u alter based on surveillance data they collect during preliminary monitoring. These Xeltari carried with them extraordinary strength and dexterity, in response to the data collected on our global heroes. They also carried an infection the Jarondu’u engineered specifically for the elimination of humans.”

Refusing to acknowledge the emotions conjured by J’onn’s explanation, she queried, “Why did they just want the planet without any inhabitants?”

“Location. They were scaling invasion plans for the Segue 1 galaxy, for its wealth of dark matter, and they determined Earth was the closest inhabitable planet from which they could establish a base of operations for their incursion efforts.”

He watched his words coil discomfortingly beneath her skin. When she spoke again, he could hear the weight of growing comprehension in every word.

“None of this sounds like it was a quick or easy affair—and you said it had been a while since I last stood. Begs the question: How long qualifies as ‘a while’ in your mind?”

J’onn deferred his response to the sound of the fortress’s proximity alert chiming somewhere outside the room they occupied. She noted with a healthy degree of trepidation the nervous tic hooking into the corner of his eye.

“You might want to back up behind the pod, Ms. Grant. I have a feeling this is going to be a bumpy interaction for several minutes.”

Cat swallowed back whatever response she had in mind at the cacophony from somewhere outside the room, followed by a furious roar tearing toward their location. Boot treads slipping against the slick deck beneath her, she barely slid behind the pod before being knocked the rest of the way to the floor by the unmerciful force of something— _someone?_ —slamming into J’onn.

Peering around the pod’s thruster, Cat startled at the sight of the hulking form pinning J’onn to the wall with one hand as easily as she might hold a napkin aloft. Free hand gesturing aggressively toward the pod, the figure leaned into J’onn’s space, the massive muscles beneath her skintight clothing tensing and flexing with even the smallest movements.

The voice, once familiar as the melody of a favorite song, tore desperate and cruel from her mouth, snapping words Cat realized were completely foreign in context but most certainly not in tone.

J’onn shook his head at the first pause, responding in whatever language she spoke. His attempts to soothe, however, seemed only to stoke her anger higher.

Free hand finally pulling back into position to land a solid jab, her hips twisted enough to open up her form and features for a clearer view.

Even beneath the woman’s ferocious mask of fury, Cat felt recognition and relief release her from the undertow of her unease.

Carefully rising and stepping out from the shadow of the pod, she watched J’onn’s gaze flick toward her. She braced herself for the moment his attacker followed his attention, head swiveling swiftly, eyes burning with supernova swelter.

The smaller blonde refused the flinch she felt tightening her body, instead pushing forward another small step, hands open and extended like shooting stars. Staring into the white-hot glare focused on her until she felt her eyes watering from the effort—watering, too, from the incomprehensible agony she could feel rolling from the body before her—she softly let fall the quiet prayer of hope within her.

“Kara?”


	4. Chapter 4

J’onn felt the flex of her fingers into his sternum, titanium spikes replacing the air in his lungs with sharp stabs of pain. Still, he calmed his own expression and willed himself to remain unfazed by the maelstrom of emotions struggling for control before him.

And then the spikes withdrew, dropping him heavily, his knees flexing and creaking against the hard shove of ground beneath him.

Spinning away with graceless haste, she stalked forward several steps—and froze. Whatever turmoil clouded her features reflected in Cat’s expression with perfect clarity.

“Kara,” she repeated, certainty steadying the previous, unacceptable waver.

Shadows of reminiscence lingered along the now hardened edges of the woman before her. Traces of kindness, whispers of affection, hints of benevolence—all the traits Cat suspected were ingrained too deeply for any hardship to ever fully vanquish.

Moving across the gap between them, she tipped her head back, the lines of her profile strong and sharp even in the room’s dim light. One of her eyebrows drifted upward slowly, expectant in her feigned impatience.

Slowly, Kara allowed her eyes to cool into their natural blue diamond brightness. Recognition hung in the limbo of her stare, unvoiced but also undeniable.

Letting herself feel the moment fully, Cat tilted her weight to one side, hips shifting with familiar poise, hands gliding up the curve of her back to their regular perch.

Kara drew closer—always pulled so easily into the well of Cat’s energy—lips parting to release an unsure tremble of breath. Her whole body shuddered, in fact, muscles weary from holding on to the wisp of a promise now made unbelievably real.

“It’s you.”

In the tectonic shift of those two small words, Cat watched her hero rise, free from the bruising bonds of grief no longer interminable. Disbelief, however, still darkened the unnerving glare focused on her.

When she spoke again, though she stared at Cat, she addressed J’onn. “This is real. You wouldn’t deceive me.”

Her words flowed with foreign flourish gilded in accusation and doubt.

Affecting her most obdurate sigh, Cat dropped her hands and moved forward, hips swaying with that extra touch of assertive swagger she knew could always capture her hero’s focus.

“While he might excel at duplication,” she scoffed, “I can assure you, what you see before you is the certified original.”

She halted well within Kara’s personal space and crossed her arms. Blue eyes shifted with a speed Cat could barely track. Her hands, however, rose with glacial temerity, not even her near doubled mass of muscle strong enough to fight against her clear fear of betrayal.

In full Cat fashion, the smaller blonde snagged Kara’s wrists in her grip, a roguish leer lighting her expression at the way the hero became instantly pliable to her touch. The blush to darken the weathered skin of her cheeks curled Cat’s lips with contentment as she settled Kara’s hands along her hips.

Unwilling to stop there, she reached up, pushing her fingers through tangled waves of once lustrous hair that now crackled beneath her touch. With little space left between them, she took a moment to re-learn the visage before her. Fingers dropped down to trace the lines carved into skin long ravaged by battle and time—cheeks hollowed by sorrow and eyes creased by strain.

“I’m so sorry, my darling, for whatever you’ve been through while I’ve been gone.”

She watched the hero chase her touch, a soft scrape of sound echoing in her throat and her fingers curling too eagerly into the small of her back.

“You’re finally here.”

The inexorable expanse of years captured in Kara’s statement unraveled Cat’s composure in ways she loathed. For the hero, however, she put on her most undaunted airs and replied, “I’d say I was fashionably late, but—”

“Fashion and time both wait for Cat Grant.”

Losing herself to the moment, the smaller blonde leaned into her laughter, her whole body pressing into the immovable mass of Kara’s muscled frame. Her lips brushed Kara’s cheek ever so briefly before she rested her head against her shoulder and relaxed into her possessive grip.

J’onn collected his pack from beside the pod and carefully moved around the two women. With an acknowledging hum, Cat sighed, “Have we outstayed our welcome at the Royal Palace of Oz?”

Kara stiffened as J’onn gripped her shoulder while watching the smaller blonde. “I think it’s time we relocated to where we can bring Ms. Grant up to speed, don’t you?”

To Cat’s surprise, Kara responded in what she assumed was Kryptonese. Whatever she said drew J’onn’s brows together in concern. At the sight of him shaking his head, however, she stated in a voice steeled against any refusal, _“fanf chahv.”_

His resigned sigh visibly deflated his stance even as he once more morphed into the form he’d held at Cat’s awakening.

“One,” he warned as he slipped his arms through the pack’s straps. “But then we must move forward, Kara.”

Her silence clearly dissatisfied him, but he continued onward out the room. “We need to get Ms. Grant to shelter and food now. We’ll talk later.”

Offering no further argument in any language, she dipped low enough to slip an arm under Cat’s legs and lift her from the ground. The smaller blonde’s arms flailed briefly before wrapping securely around Kara. The thick lines of her neck and shoulder muscles flexed beneath the grip as she turned to meet Cat’s questioning gaze.

“I won’t let you go.”

The promise in her words stilled whatever worry that fluttered in her chest. Without hesitation, she tucked her head into Kara’s warmth, resisting the urge to press a kiss to the crook of her neck as she felt the hero lift up from the ground and float them onward.


	5. Chapter 5

Much later, Cat would look back at that first flight with Kara after her rescue as the eye of a long-stalled hurricane at the brink of re-ignition.

Learning how much time had passed after Kara’s desperate bid to save her—learning how the decades forever lost to her had reclaimed all she had once cherished, with only Kara to bear witness in her stead, had leveled her emotionally. Even words withdrew from her reach, her anguish instead flowing in formless sounds that shred both their hearts with its broken dirge.

Hours later on her first night on her new Earth, Cat had lain beside Kara on the makeshift bed they’d cobbled together on the floor of J’onn’s living room, cheeks stiff from dried tears and mind aching from the supersonic speeds of her racing thoughts.

Cobalt eyes steadily scanned her features, guilt and regret carved into the deep lines of Kara’s mournful expression. 

“I’m sorry.”

Kara knew the rapids that raged beneath the blankness of Cat’s stare. However, the smaller blonde surprised her by drawing her gaze into focus and nodding slowly in agreement with Kara’s words.

“I’m sorry, too—for many things. For my sons, for your family. For everyone, really,” she finally declared with the slightest of shrugs. Her eyes burned with the strain of re-caging her sadness. She skimmed her fingertips along Kara’s cheek and down her neck before sweeping them along the hard flex of her trapezius and gripping the scarred flesh of a bulging deltoid.

How hard and unforgiving had the battles been to have forged this body beside her?

Refocusing on the unexpected softness of the hero’s expression, she restated, “I’m sorry for many things, but I’m not sorry I’m here with you. I’m not sorry you saved my life, Kara.”

Uncertain of her eloquence with a language she’d nearly completely abandoned, Kara instead shuffled closer and offered Cat the comfort of her embrace.

Waking a few hours later, Cat realized with almost anticlimactic clarity the one thing that had survived the years of her absence: the truth of Kara’s place in her life. She knew many of her losses had wounded her, even in her stasis, some deeply enough to never heal.

An image of Carter, his face bright with laughter, flickered unforgivably once more in her mind.

She knew, too, however, how nothing she might face next would matter so long as Kara was at her side. 

Together that morning over a sparse breakfast that somehow thankfully included coffee, J’onn and Kara roughly sketched out the decades for her, of relentless waves of Xeltari strike forces, each one deadlier than the previous. The losses were innumerable, the destruction devastating.

When the conversation turned toward the more hopeful path of reconstruction and recuperation, J’onn took the lead, as he spent much of his time now helping the Earth’s survivors rebuild from the chaos.

“In between curing alien infections and rescuing sidelined media moguls, of course.”

Amusement eased what she recognized as his natural lingering tension, his still unfamiliar face smoothing significantly.

“So, how often do you change how you look?”

Catching the Martian’s uncertainty, Kara answered in his stead. “I asked J’onn for this change. Seeing him as he looked when—when— _before_ ,” she finally stammered, “it was—”

“Hard.”

Kara nodded, gaze averted to the tangle of her fingers resting in her lap.

“It’s why I spend most of my time up in the satellite Wayne Technologies launched originally as a tracking and defense station against incoming Xeltari incursions.”

Cat nearly slipped from her chair in her haste to look fully at Kara. “You live in orbit?”

“It’s easier that way.”

Whole libraries of literature revealed less than the weighted sentiment of Kara’s simple statement.

“I hope you’ll find more reason to stay earth-bound a bit longer.”

The hero’s gaze remained downcast, but Cat caught the afterimage of a smile at the corner of her mouth.

The rest of that day, Kara relented to Cat’s request to see what was left of National City. They started, of course, where it had all begun and ended for the first act of their lives together.

CatCo Tower had crumbled downward in unequal measure, a jagged skeleton now barely scraping the fractured skyline. Kara knew the exact spot below the rubble where the illuminated CatCo signage had fallen, smashed into pieces long unrecognizable.

“I tried so hard to protect them all.”

The duo stood together atop the precarious remains of the building scaled by the Xeltari originally sent to attack Kara. Even as Cat felt the uneven, cracked concrete shift beneath her, she felt, too, whatever means Kara had of securing her within the protective field of her own powers.

Turning away from the remains of her forgotten empire, Cat stared expectantly.

“I tried to save the city, but the Xeltari—they weren’t programmed to stop. They weren’t programmed to feel pain or pity or fear. They were programmed to fight until they fell—and by then, the next wave of _improved_ Xeltari were already on their way.”

She shifted her gaze upward toward the sky. Cat caught the scanning switch of her eyes, stuck, perhaps permanently, in defensive mode.

“No matter how hard I fought, I couldn’t fight the way they did—the way so many humans did.”

Shadows of loss blinded her for several heavy beats of her heart, her lips trembling around the mourning prayer she whispered into the ether.

“Earth needed you to survive, Kara.”

“Earth needed me to fight harder for _it_ to survive,” she countered, in a tone so unlike any Cat had ever heard from her before.

Far in the distance, Cat caught movement along the horizon. Letting her eyes adjust to the glint of sunlight along the endless expanse of the Pacific, she flicked her fingers toward the fishing boat gliding steadily toward deeper seas.

“Whether we number billions or hundreds, we find a way to survive.”

She lifted her hand enough to find the hero’s, entwining their fingers together in a solid grip.

Knowing the location of Cat’s penthouse had long ago toppled to dust, she flew them on a slow spiral around the rest of the city before diverting toward a flight path up along the coastline. Cat could see signs of life the further away from the city center they soared.

When Kara finally took them down along a familiar stretch of beach a hundred miles north of National City, Cat startled at the sight of her beach house. Though it showed weathering beyond the simple salvation of a fresh coat of paint and some proper landscaping, it also showed signs of tending and basic repair. The smaller blonde shoved aside the wistful twinge within her.

“At least one of my properties was able to provide shelter to someone.”

Kara frowned as she tried to translate the unspoken meaning of Cat’s statement. “I’ve been taking care of this house.”

At the curious jolt to pull Cat’s gaze to her face, she explained, “I brought Carter here after—after I placed you in stasis.”

She stared up at the structure, memories casting phantoms into her view. “The last time I saw him, he made me swear I would continue to take care of it so you would have somewhere familiar to return when we—when we finally figured out how to bring you home.”

The structure wavered along its edges as tears tumbled from Cat’s eyes.

“Was this where he—did he live here?”

“For a brief time. I relocated him and his father to several DEO safe houses to protect them from the worst of the attacks. He lived here when he finally returned to this coast on his own, and he and his husband would stop in for stays whenever they passed through. They were too busy helping survivors relocate to safe houses to stay in one place for too long, though.”

She intertwined their hands once more. “You would have been so proud of him, Cat. Even with the world falling apart around him, he was every bit the amazing man you raised him to become.”

At Cat’s continued silence, Kara gently tugged her forward. However, she instantly caught the smaller blonde’s resistance and froze in place. 

Eyeline locked to the house before them, Cat whispered, “I’m not quite ready to face that ghost today.”

Kara nodded at the words, her own pantheon of insufferable losses a permanent companion for far too many years.

Back at J’onn’s, Cat picked at what he’d prepared for dinner before giving most of her portion to Kara and heading back to their bed.

When Kara finally slid in beside her, she rolled into the hero’s chest, her hands coiling into the thin fabric of her shirt.

The tears she cried that second night were silent as Kara held her close and hummed a tune she knew belonged beyond the stars.

Early the next morning, long before daybreak, Cat woke to the conscious decision to avoid all the places that might stir sadness within either of them. Instead, she burrowed more deeply into Kara’s arms, drawing a surprised (though enjoyably so) laugh and a hug that balanced barely on the right side of bearable. With her eyes closed, she murmured, “Take me somewhere that still makes you happy.”

At first, Kara simply stared upward, her focus far from the room and Cat’s soft request. When she shifted back to attention, however, her expression lightened and she gave a decisive nod.

Less than an hour later, they sat wrapped together in a blanket watching the sun rise over Bolivia’s Laguna Colorada.

Deep crimson illuminated the lake as the first rays of sunlight glided across the shallow waters. Soon, the entire landscape was suffused in the most unearthly hues of red Cat had ever witnessed.

“The color comes from the algae that thrives on the lake’s alkalinity and heat.”

Glancing up into Kara’s profile, she caught the way the light gathered in the tear tracks along her cheeks. Her eyes, however, held a well of contentment as she surveyed the sanguine landscape.

“This is what Krypton looked like, all the time—every inch blessed by Rao’s light and bathed in his glory.”

She paused long enough for them to watch the sun crest a distant rise, shifting the light to slightly more vermilion hues. Without looking away from the brightening horizon, she whispered, “I started flying here right after I became Supergirl. Being her made me feel as though I had finally found my true purpose here—but also hurt in ways I’d never anticipated. She reminded me constantly how different I was and how solitary my life had to remain because of the gifts I was choosing to use. When I found this spot, it was like Rao himself had guided me as a way to remind me how I would always be within his light, no matter where I was.”

She shifted her gaze to take in the wonder and veneration of Cat’s expression. “You’re the only person I ever wanted to bring here—even back then.”

They made love atop the precipice overlooking the lake, Cat coming apart in Kara’s embrace with a certainty and sadness that, no matter how much time they’d lost, this was always meant to be their path.

Staring into the lagoon blue depths of her hero’s eyes, she let slip her hold on the last secret she ever dared to guard.

“I love you, Kara.”

Rao’s light would never compare to the brightness of Kara’s smile at hearing those words.


	6. Chapter 6

Watercolor patterns of slate gray dawn spread across the sky, diffusing the light of another overcast morning. Blinking the sleep fog from her eyes, Cat exhaled and stretched backward against warm, bare muscle. The arm always curled around her waist during the night flexed with the movement, an involuntary tug that shifted her body more deeply into Kara’s hug.

“You don’t sleep enough.”

She felt the words vibrate where her back pressed against Kara’s chest.

“I’m good on sleep for several lifetimes, thank you.”

The vibration broke into a full chuckle that tingled across her skin in delicious waves. Any sound of humor or joy from Kara was a hard-won possession, tucked discreetly away in Cat’s mental coffers to savor throughout the space between.

At the first press of lips against the nape of her neck, she knew the chance of them leaving bed before sunlight burned through the morning cloud cover had just drastically diminished. The way her head automatically tipped to the side, exposing more of her neck to Kara’s careful attention, confirmed her eager acceptance of this truth.

To be fair, Cat craved the nascent pleasure of their intimacy in ways she’d once relinquished to the larger drives of her life. Children, empires, and legacies, after all, needed time to grow, to expand, to root—and they didn’t leave much time to the unessential interruption of her own personal desires.

The melancholy freedom forced upon her by the decades forever lost released her from the bonds of her own expectations. The Queen’s kingdom was now in ruins, the Queen herself long forgotten.

Except by the woman whose strong arms held her close every night and whose steadfast focus saw only her.

Calloused hands scorched matching trails up along the dips of her ribs and covered her breasts. The trail of kisses diverged from her neck down to the curve of her shoulder, the pressure enough that Cat knew there would be bruises from the hero’s vigorous passion.

Beneath the sensations that set Cat’s every nerve alight, an unsettling desperation crackled through Kara’s affections, intensifying each time they touched.

Intensifying as well were the daily arguments Cat hadn’t missed between Kara and J’onn, each conducted in a language she might not understand, but in harsh whispers she spoke far too fluently.

Breathing deeply, she reached up and tried to halt Kara’s hands.

“Before we get too carried away,” she practically moaned, bucking at Kara’s fingers pinching and tugging with worshipful fervor, “I need to know, Kara.”

The muscles pressed against her back stiffened and stilled instantly at the pronouncement. The attentive kisses ceased as well in response to Cat’s halting hold. Another beat and Cat felt the chilled air of the room against her back as Kara shrank away from their previously inseparable position.

Cat quickly rolled over in time to catch darkened pupils contracting with Kara’s glare as she added just enough speed to slip away from Cat’s reach and to her feet.

The smaller blonde stared with increasing confusion as she watched Kara yank on her boy shorts and tank top, both discarded hastily the previous night in the hero’s bid to distract Cat from her questioning. The top’s fabric slipped down over Kara’s abs, the wrinkled lines of too many scars disappearing from sight.

When the pacing started, accompanied by rapidly muttered Kryptonese, Cat pushed herself upright, clutching the sheet against her bare chest.

“Kara, _enough_!”

It made no matter how much time passed, Kara would always jump to obey a Cat Grant order snapped with such familiar, curt precision. Feet shuffling to a halt and words left sizzling at the tip of a now still tongue, the hero stared expectantly.

“Enough,” she repeated, “of whatever the hell you’re keeping from me, because I’m through with all of it.”

Sliding to the edge of the bed while tugging the sheet along with her, she covered herself in a tangled makeshift toga and pushed her way well into Kara’s personal space. The hero’s eyebrows drew together with worry as she looked down into Cat’s furious expression.

“You will tell me _now_ why you and J’onn keep fighting and why you behave as though every day might be your last with me!”

The hero crumpled with a despondency that physically pained Cat to know she had caused. Turning away so as not to witness the smaller blonde’s reaction to her next words, she softly muttered, “Not every day. Just today.”

The rightful ire Cat had felt previously slowed to a low, steady roil.

“I don’t understand.”

Perching on the edge of the bed, feet planted flatly and firmly against the floor, Kara slouched forward until she could rest her elbows atop her knees. She stared down at her hands dangling into the space between.

_“fanf chahv.”_

Cat frowned at the familiarity of the words, recalling after a moment how Kara had declared them as they were preparing to leave the fortress after her rescue.

“One week. _This_ week—it was all me being selfish,” she confessed.

Looking up, she extended a hand, which Cat of course accepted even as she huffed with faux impertinence. With the slightest, knowing curl of her lip, she tugged the smaller blonde into the space between her knees.

Cat felt the tremor in the fingertips Kara skimmed along her cheek. “It was me being happier than I’ve been since that morning I saw you waving to me from your balcony at CatCo—right before everything broke in ways I thought we might never figure out how to fix.”

Unable to contain the decades of desire denied, she pulled the smaller blonde down into her lap. Kisses fierce and forlorn crashed into Cat’s lips, skimmed the jut of her jawline, once more bruised the porcelain delicacy of her neck.

Hating how she had to keep them focused—no matter how blissfully _good_ Kara’s lips felt against her skin—Cat pushed against the hero’s sternum to draw her attention.

“Kara, please, tell me what you mean.”

Her resigned sigh cooled the skin she had just been kissing with fevered longing. As she shifted back, she dropped her gaze to the small hands she took into her own grip.

“J’onn and I—we’ve been waiting a very long time to bring you home. For a while, we lost hope, thinking the Xeltari virus was too much for us to ever cure.”

The sunlight of the faintest smile slipped along her lips.

“But here you are.”

Cat’s grip tightened as she settled more comfortably into Kara’s lap. “Here I am.”

The sunlight once more dimmed beneath the dark curve of her regret. “But you can’t stay.”

She silenced Cat with a wild, desperate shake of her head.

“Our plan was always to send you back as soon as we were able to bring you out of stasis and heal you, so you could take back all we’ve gathered on how to defeat the Jarondu’u and the Xeltari.”

A wobble of her chin was her first betrayal, followed quickly by tears slipping into the crevices of her cheeks. “But I couldn’t let you go so soon—not after waiting for you for so long.”

Cat’s fingers carded through the hero’s splintered locks in soft, soothing patterns. “Why not go back yourself?”

“The Xeltari clones—each time we killed one, the virus they carried dispersed into the atmosphere. By the time we realized, we were _all_ infected—the virus had accumulated in our cells and we had no way to remove it or stop its progression. My own healing ability is only slowing the inevitable. If any of us had tried to go back before finding a cure, we would have carried the infection with us to the past and wiped out humanity for the Jarondu’u ourselves.”

Seeing the fear bloom in Cat’s gaze, she wrapped her arms around her waist and rested her head over the increased rhythm within her chest.

“I swear on my life, you’re safe, Cat. I made Alex, Eliza, and J’onn promise they wouldn’t bring you out of stasis until they were certain they’d found a way to eliminate the infection from your body and inoculate you against whatever might linger in our atmosphere.”

Her muscled frame shrank beneath the weight of a grief too long borne on weary shoulders. Slender fingers gripped the hero’s arms to draw her back from her memories.

“Is that what happened to Alex and Eliza?”

“Eliza, yes. Alex—she fought like the Xeltari did.”

When she looked back up, the glimpse of suffering Cat caught within her stare knocked the air from her lungs.

“The Jarondu’u are still out there, Cat. We didn’t beat them—just caused them to pull back. For all we know, they’re amassing a great enough army of Xeltari that there will be no stopping them this time.”

Her azure gaze calmed behind the shimmer of unshed tears. “Our past selves need you so desperately. You can bring with you all we will need to defeat the Jarondu’u in mere _months_ instead of the torment of nearly a hundred years lost and millions of lives destroyed. You will save humanity.”

“But what about _you_?”

She let her hold tighten around Cat’s delicate frame. “You’ll save me, too—the version of me still worth saving.”

Already prepared for the argument knitting itself together within Cat’s thoughts, Kara pressed, “Who I am today is not who I ever wanted to be.”

Cat stilled at the confession, having already fervently mapped its truth along every line and scar carved across Kara’s body. This version of her hero had endured yet another world of insufferable losses, each one a permanent excision of the hope Cat had always assumed was as intrinsic a part of Kara as the sunny smiles and unearthly blue eyes.

Fingers delicately journeyed along the demarcations of Kara’s face as she watched the nearly cooled embers of that hope flicker softly in her pleading gaze.

“Okay,” she finally breathed. She held her fingers still against the tears that collided against them.

Unable to lend voice to the swell of her emotions, Kara instead floated over until Cat once more spread out beneath her. At the feel of insistent lips once more trailing heatedly along her collarbones, Cat tangled her fingers in the hero’s thick mane and tugged for her attention.

“Just hold me, Kara. Just a little while longer.”

The weighted meaning behind her request drew Kara’s arms around her as she settled into the bedding and hugged Cat as tightly as she dared.

When they came to the kitchen a few hours later, dressed and somber, J’onn understood it was time.

“We can leave for the fortress after breakfast.”

Cat sank into the seat opposite him, her hand instinctively flattening against her stomach as she did.

“I’m not quite in the mood for food at the moment.”

Her eyes never strayed from watching Kara slink along the back of the room before stopping in front of the window. Tension rippled downward from the high, tight line of her broad shoulders.

“You should still eat something, Ms. Grant.”

She huffed at the Martian’s insistent deference.

“Things are going to move quickly and you might not get another chance to eat for many hours.”

He reached down for the pack setting by his feet. Cat understood in that moment he had decided she was going back today, regardless of Kara’s wishes. Something in his determination both impressed and angered her.

Nodding and waving a hand dismissively in perfect sync, she replied, “Tell me about everything in the pack so I don’t waste their time.”

The Martian pulled out all the contents, explaining succinctly what each item was and even who Cat should give it to so they could start immediately analyzing and putting it all to use.

“They might not believe you at first, but you have to be forceful and keep them moving,” he implored. His mouth twitched in response to a distant memory. “I know you can do it though. Just pretend I’ve brought you another latte with whole milk.”

The sight of Cat’s eyes widening in surprise unlocked his control over his full smile. Even Kara’s body relaxed noticeably at J’onn’s unexpected playfulness.

As he packed the contents away once more, he chuckled at the eye roll he’d earned while sharing with her a few other details, about himself and others at the DEO, that he hoped would help her convince them quickly that they should believe her. Passing the bag across the table when he finished, he went about preparing her something to eat. She agreed begrudgingly, though watching Kara continue to keep her distance knotted her gut in an almost unbearable way.

Once they suited back up for the fortress’s frigid climate, Kara finally broke her standoffishness, scooping Cat delicately into her arms. She nestled as deeply as possible into the now familiar press of strong arms. The whole flight, she nuzzled against the thick muscle of Kara’s neck, unable to halt the few errant tears that defied her control.

Inside the fortress, J’onn stopped within the main entrance, dusting snow from his hair and shoulders.

“Thank you, Ms. Grant.”

Her dismissal came in the precarious arch of her brow. “You deserve all the thanks here, for not giving up on me. I will, however, expect your past self to shower me abundantly in praise and gratitude.”

The still foreign features broke into a smile as he surprised her with a massive hug. “Be patient,” he warned half-jokingly. “My past self might still be slightly frightened by you.”

He stepped away, relishing the way Cat _tsked_ dismissively even as she blushed at the statement. His gaze cut toward Kara in acknowledgement of her silence. With a final nod to Cat, he announced, “I will wait here.”

Kara proceeded back toward the room where she had first seen Cat on her return. She smiled sadly at the way Cat caught her hand as she passed, slowing her down so they could walk together.

Inside the room, Kara released Cat’s grip and focused on the projector that had brought back Cat’s pod. With a few settings adjustments, she activated the projector long enough to deposit a small device on the icy floor in front of them.

“I hid it in the same place I hid you, to make sure the Xeltari might never destroy it.”

Picking it up carefully, she presented it to Cat in the palm of her hand. “A friend of Barry’s built it for me to help me jump between Earths whenever I wanted to visit them. Winn—”

Her voice chipped against the hard pain still associated with the name and she paused to refocus. Breathing deeply, she pushed down the emotions she had learned through the decades to deaden within her.

“Winn figured out how to set it to a specific time on our own Earth instead.” She felt the surprising warmth of embarrassment rising in her cheeks at her next confession. “I made Kelex record the moment I had to send you away to save you.”

Her gaze pinned to Cat’s. “Tell the past me you know that when you arrive. Tell me you know that I sent you to where I got trapped on my journey to Earth. And tell me you know what I whispered as I placed you in the pod.”

Her words had slowly reeled Cat closer until she could once more wrap her arms around the smaller blonde’s waist.

“What did you whisper?”

_“:zhaodh w rrip eh.”_

Kara released the alien words into the space between them on the currents of an intimate whisper. As she smiled sadly, she pressed a kiss to the spot where she had breathed those words what felt like several lifetimes ago.

“I have loved you for so long, Cat. If I have learned anything from the years since I had to send you away, it’s that never telling you that has been my greatest regret. I was a coward back then, and I have endured my penance long enough.”

She forced herself to meet Cat’s gaze even as she felt the shards of her shattering heart pierce her chest.

“When you go back, please promise me you’ll find the courage I couldn’t. Please be brave for both of us—because the thought of wasting any of the precious time I could be sharing with you or living through more decades with only the shadow of _what if_ as my constant companion? It will break me apart.”

The crack in her voice threatened at a deeper breach more tragic than Cat feared the hero could endure. She rested her hands against the strong thrum of the hero’s heart, relishing its steady beat and remembering how it felt to fall asleep each night to its melody beneath her ear.

“Are you sure, Kara? Are you sure you could love me then the way you love me now? Because if I end up pushing you away, I think that might break _me_.”

“It will scare me,” she finally conceded, “but I believe I will rise to your challenge just as I always did.”

Even with the weight of the coming inevitability bearing painfully down on them both, Cat could spare a smile for her hero.

Giving in to the moment, Cat leaned forward, her lips finding Kara’s with unflagging devotion. She felt her breath hitch in her chest at the broken sound her kiss pulled from the hero, but she pressed on, needing Kara to feel the promise in her touch.

“I’ll be brave for both of us.”

She felt Kara nod her understanding as they kept their foreheads pressed together.

With a regretful sigh, she finally stepped back and turned away. Purposefully refusing to look back into what she knew would be an utterly broken stare, she straightened the pack’s straps against her shoulders and declared, “It’s time, Kara.”

Blue light flared before her into a vortex of brightness and bluster. The pull of the swirling winds soon became more than she could resist. Without another look, she stumbled forward, disappearing into the deafening roar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've got one more chapter, which I'm nearly finished editing. I will do my best to post it later tonight or early tomorrow!


	7. Chapter 7

The projector whirred into silence, the fortress chamber thrumming briefly with its echo. As she stared at the now empty space before her, she felt the reality of her decision deep within her chest, thick bands of despair twisting around her lungs until she imagined they might collapse.

“What did I do?”

Kelex hovered beside her, understanding the rhetorical nature of her question, as she struggled to force the chaos of her thoughts into some kind of submission. There was too much to do for her to waste these precious moments. Alex needed her. National City needed her—and yet she couldn’t rally the strength required to turn away and leave.

Cat was gone—stowed away like a broken treasure, irreparable but too precious to lose. Regret twitched in her fingertips as she strained to hold back sobs she knew would decimate her if she allowed them any ground.

A pulsing vibration drew her up, forced her to rally from the despondency binding itself to her every thought. The air behind her churned into a swirl of color and cadence that split into an unexpected yet familiar vortex.

Kara narrowed her gaze as she watched a silhouette step from the breach. As the vortex pulled back into itself until once more healing the rift, Cat Grant came to a stop before her. Jaw unlocking to accommodate a startled gasp, Kara shook her head in clear confusion.

“What the fuck?”

Were it not for the wild, unraveling panic rolling off the hero in waves Cat fought to tread, the smaller blonde might have found her out-of-character profanity amusing. As it was, however, she simply wanted to help restore some calm to the moment.

“I’m sorry, Kara. I can’t imagine how upset you must be right now.”

“What?” Shaking her head as if trying to reset her thoughts, she stammered, “Who—are you—where did—how—”

Gasping suddenly, her eyes widened until white ringed her pupils. “Is this a multiverse-wide attack? Which Earth are you from?”

Realizing the terror clearly beginning to overwhelm the hero, Cat stepped close enough to steady Kara in place with strong grips to her biceps.

“It’s all right, Kara.”

Angered by the unwanted placation from this unexpected stranger, Kara jerked away from her touch. “ _Nothing_ is all right,” she snarled, her eyes growing noticeably brighter as she leveled her glare on this uncertainty before her. “I don’t know who the hell you are—”

“Kara, it’s me! I’m Cat— _your_ Cat,” she emphasized, hearing the catch of air in Kara’s throat when she did.

“No.”

She clicked her tongue and crossed her arms. “Don’t be stubborn, Kiera.”

The familiar mispronunciation jarred Kara enough to dim her fiery glare. Still, she refused to give in to the possibility—to the dangerous _hope_ —of the other woman’s words being true.

“No—no, there is no way you’re who you say you are!”

“Yes, and Anderson once told me there was no way I’d paraglide off the Burj Khalifa.” Narrow shoulders hitched languorously. “I’m in the business of proving people wrong.”

“I’m not wrong.”

Cat could hear just enough doubt to confirm she had the in she needed.

“Beyond the fact that you just placed me into stasis in your cousin’s pod to save me from the poison even your sister couldn’t figure out how to stop from killing me, why are you so hell bent on refusing to believe me?”

The facts Cat casually dropped through her question served their purpose of rattling even further Kara’s conviction. The hero stared in silent confusion, lost for a convincing rebuttal.

Even as her defensive stance relaxed noticeably, she waved a hand erratically toward the smaller blonde’s lower half. “Cat Grant does not _do_ cargo pants.”

Cat shifted into a more familiar stance, her hands perched on her hips, elegant fingers playfully tapping the waist band of the pants in question. “I do when my only personal shopper is a Martian with a penchant for military clothing.”

Kara’s gaze snapped back upward, seizing on Cat’s expression with a desperation the smaller blonde needed to quell.

“Kara, I swear on my sons’ lives, it’s me. I know you just sent me away, to the same place you were trapped on your journey to our world.”

She choked in a ragged breath at the sudden thought of Kara, so small and lost inside her pod, wrapped in the velvet darkness of timeless space.

“But you also just sent me back—back from much too far into the future, because the war rolling toward our shore will be long and vicious and will come closer to breaking you than I can even bear considering. So, I’m begging you, Kara, please— _please_ believe me.”

Beneath the hesitant glare, her hope burned brightly.

“I sent you back?”

“You used the device you got from a friend of Barry’s to move between Earths. You had Winn figure out how to reprogram it to a specific time rather than a place. You chose this moment because—”

At Cat’s hesitation, the hero pressed pleadingly, “Because why?”

Peripherally registering the presence of the fortress’s service bot, she replied, “Because you said you asked Kelex to record the moment you sent me away.”

She moved forward, her nerves a summer storm surging.

“You told me what you whispered as you placed me into stasis.”

The hero’s defiant expectation stoked pride within her chest.

_“:zhaodh w rrip eh.”_

Stare softening beneath the deluge of her emotions finally breaking, Kara shuffled across the short distance between them, her hands catching the smaller blonde by her waist and pulling her flush against her.

“Cat?”

Still hearing the frightened uncertainty in Kara’s voice, Cat threaded her arms beneath the heavy pleats of her cape and hugged her as tightly as she could. She held the hero close for several selfish beats, reacquainting herself through their embrace with the lithe definition of this Kara’s body.

“I’m here, darling. You never gave up hope that I could be saved.”

She leaned back and lifted a hand to an unblemished cheek, the skin smooth and soft beneath her touch. She offered an apologetic smile as she stroked the hero’s cheekbone with her thumb.

“We need to get to the DEO. J’onn and you sent me back with what you believe is everything you’ll need to stop what’s coming.”

Taking a deep breath and a chance, she rose up on the tips of her boots and kissed Kara’s cheek.

“I promise, though, when this is all finished, we will talk—about everything.”

As she began to move away, she huffed in surprise at the way Kara drew her close again, spinning them up from the chamber floor. Without another word, she flew them back through the fortress’s main hall and out the entrance. She paused long enough to watch the door slide shut before rocketing upward to her normal cruising altitude.

Tucking Cat closely against her, she sped up to what she knew was her fastest comfortable speed for humans. As the minutes and miles rolled by, she clung tightly to the small body in her hold, soothed in a way she was too relieved to allow embarrass her.

When she soared through the DEO bay doors and landed in the center of HQ Ops, she let Cat down to stand on her own while keeping her hands settled around the curve of her hips. If Cat noticed, Kara was grateful she let it pass without mention or rejection.

“Supergirl?”

The baritone voice rose above the loud beat of boot soles against tile. J’onn and Alex were first to reach her, both staring cautiously at the unexpected return passenger with the hero.

Cat’s first response was a silent conveyance of thoughts she hoped were aimed toward the Martian staring at her with open concern. Catching his continued focus, she began to think about one of the moments his future self had assured her would convince him of her truth.

Comprehension and surprise flickered in eyes that flashed crimson at the memory Cat was directing at him: of a young Kara broken by the specter of her mother, conjured by his abilities and unleashed upon her for good though misguided reasons.

“I’ve never told anyone that before.”

Cat shot him a dangerous glare, regardless of her relief at reaching him the way she’d intended. The moment his future self had shared this particular memory with her, she had known she would be addressing it with him in her present. “And you’d better never pull something like that again, no matter how good your intentions.”

The Martian nodded, continuing with her clear permission to skim through the flotsam of Cat’s most recent memories. His surprise grew as he catalogued in reverse the timeline of her future journey. When he had finished processing the memories, he bowed his head, unable to meet Kara’s pleading stare.

“I’m sorry it took us so long to save you.”

Alex looked at him in bewilderment but he merely shook his head. “We need to start processing everything in Ms. Grant’s backpack immediately.”

He held out a hand into which Cat gladly placed the strap of her pack.

“Alex will need to begin working on the anti-virus formula now if she’s to have enough synthesized for both widespread dispersal and individual inoculations before the next wave of Xeltari arrive. Winn needs to load the star charts so he can map the location of the Jarondu’u home world and program the DEO satellite for monitoring and tracking. The next wave of Xeltari has already launched so we won’t have the proposed long-range defenses in place in time, but we’ll at least be better prepared for this round’s arrival. I can help contact the President—I’ve got a number guaranteed to reach her in two rings. We need to move now, though. Arranging global defense is going to be a challenge even for Olivia.”

Silence and stares surrounded the CEO when finally she paused to take a breath. Beside her, Kara whispered nervously, “Global defense?”

Alex stepped forward to stand beside J’onn, drawing Kara’s and Cat’s attentions. “What exactly is coming, Ms. Grant?”

Reaching down, the smaller blonde gripped one of Kara’s hands, offering a squeeze as comfort.

“That killer space porcupine that caught me in its attack on Kara is known as a Xeltari. They’re clones wielded by a race known as the Jarondu’u as—as planet sweepers. The Jarondu’u use the Xeltari to decimate a world’s population, leaving the planet free for their taking. They want Earth, and the battle they’re about to unleash—”

Unable to stop herself, she turned toward Kara, her emotional surge betraying herself to J’onn’s already attuned telepathy.

“We _will_ stop them, Ms. Grant.”

J’onn’s definitive statement was enough to draw her attention once more away from Kara. She kept her thoughts, however, focused on memories of the hero as the future had altered her. Once more, the Martian filtered through what Cat was willingly allowing him to see.

He swallowed loudly as he finally met Kara’s worried stare while addressing Cat. “That will not be any of our futures, Ms. Grant, thanks to you.”

Continuing to cling tightly to Kara’s hand, the CEO replied, “I’m going to hold you to that, Director. I have it on good authority you’re still intimidated enough by me that I can hold _some_ sway.”

Catching the shocked inhalations from both Danvers sister, J’onn merely shook his head while turning toward his agents. “All right, people, it’s hustle time. Briefing room in five. We’ve got an invasion to stop.”

The cyclonic response of agents rushing to J’onn’s command spun about them at dizzying speeds. Kara, however, remained still, hand clasped in Cat’s strong grip and questioning gaze locked to Cat’s face.

With an understanding sigh, Cat used her free hand to once more cup Kara’s face. Relishing the unscarred skin beneath her touch, she reiterated her earlier promise. “When this is all over, you’ll come find me on my balcony and we will talk then.”

She pressed another kiss to Kara’s cheek, this time closer to the corner of her mouth, and hummed happily at the feeling of Kara leaning into the touch. “Now, go, before your sister injures herself slamming into a wall while trying to walk and watch us at the same time.”

Kara glanced up fast enough to catch Alex clipping a column with her shoulder, her gaze glued on her sister and Cat and her mouth agape at what she was watching. The sight stirred an incongruous giggle from the hero as she stepped away from Cat’s closeness and released her hand.

Quirking her mouth to the side to hide her own amusement, she admonished, “Chop, chop, Supergirl. We’ll talk soon, I promise.”

 _Soon_ became a relative sentiment as Kara and the DEO worked tirelessly with the world’s heroes and governments to stage a global response to the Jarondu’u invasion. What Kara’s future self had estimated would take a month stretched to four—but, in the end, they proved themselves victorious.

The worldwide celebrations lasted several weeks, nearly exhausting Kara more than the actual fighting had, but she relished every moment of joy and gratitude she observed during each parade, party, and ceremony.

Cleanup began quickly after, with Kara pitching in whenever and wherever she could during the global patrols she had taken to flying every day. Though she spent more time away from National City than she had anticipated, she knew her help would speed along the rebuild efforts in ways she couldn’t hold back sharing with as many as she could.

Back home, CatCo rode the highs of hard-earned surges in readership and viewership thanks to its entrenched reporting and exclusive in-depth interviews with many of the heroes, both human and alien, who had led the way to Earth’s victory. The Queen herself often could be found at the forefront of her empire’s efforts, never willing to ask of her staff what she wasn’t willing to give of herself tenfold.

Still, it was no small occasion to her when finally she could return to her office at the top of CatCo Tower and settle back into a semblance of the normalcy she’d nearly forgotten had once existed. At the end of her first full week back, she strolled out to her balcony, tumbler in hand, to survey her city. Her other hand gripped the balcony ledge as she fought the urge to retrieve her phone and call Carter for what would have been the fourth time that evening.

She sighed at the thought, not necessarily embarrassed by her own actions but keenly aware of her encroachment on even her younger son’s admittedly minimal boundaries when it came to her affection. She needed to accept that both her sons were fine, safe, and fully aware of how much she loved and had missed them—even if they didn’t quite understand what had occurred and would never actually experience any moment of the future she had played such an integral role in obliterating.

“Working on another last-minute exclusive?”

The CEO glanced up with a contented curl of her lips as she watched the rustle of crimson pleats and flaxen curls. “Simply enjoying the sights tonight,” she replied with a toast toward the hovering hero.

Kara blushed at the words as she floated down to stand beside Cat. “Wouldn’t you rather enjoy the view from your balcony at home, with Carter? I’m sure he would enjoy spending the evening with you.”

Cat chuckled as she leaned her elbows on the ledge, glass cupped between her hands. “He’s having a friend over for movies, pizza, and a sleepover. I figured it was the least I owed him for all the random hugs he’s had to endure since my return.”

“Doesn’t sound so terrible to me.”

Glancing sideways at the pleasantly surprising admission, Cat still teased, “Kara, I watched you hug Alex for a whole minute because she brought you a donut to one of our daily briefings.”

“Pfft, that—that was because it-it was my favorite kind of donut.”

“I thought the only requirement for that title was ‘edible.’”

She huffed at the feeling of Kara shouldering her gently. Afterward, they stood side-by-side, quietly taking in the rare unhurried moment. Cat knew Kara had made a special effort that week to stop in and check on her each evening. She knew, too, each moment spared had been a respite for the hero as well and so never tried to rush her back to whatever noble task awaited her next. Instead, she cherished what Kara could spare and patiently awaited the time when Kara felt prepared to return to the conversation promised so many months ago.

She caught the moment the hero’s mood shifted and realized that time had apparently arrived.

“How long exactly were you in the future?”

Relishing for an extra moment the eager way Kara searched her expression, she sipped slowly from her glass. The drop of Kara’s gaze to follow the shift of her throat muscles with her swallow drew amusement to her lips.

Finally, she replied in perfect Kryptonese, _“fanf chahv,”_ barely containing her smirk at Kara’s surprised gasp.

The hero recovered quickly enough from her shock (though not quickly enough to hide the emotion in her voice at once more hearing Cat speak her mother tongue) to joke, “They kicked you out after only a week? I didn’t realize you were _that_ difficult to live with.”

Kara couldn’t stop the giggle that escaped her at the glare she received, though she barely caught herself from staring too long at the pouting pinch of Cat’s lips.

“Laugh it up, Supergirl,” she quipped, her tone far more mirthful than usual as she bumped shoulders again with the hero beside her.

Leaning in enough to keep their arms touching, Kara steadied herself with several breaths. Something about the way Cat allowed their physical contact to continue gave her the strength she needed to speak, even if her voice noticeably wavered. “You’re different with me now.”

She heard what sounded almost like a pleased hum. “How so?”

“You’re—more playful,” she finally chose, garnering a glance both intrigued and inviting. “You find ways to make me happy and encourage me to laugh. Why?”

The smaller blonde set her gaze on a fixed point along the farthest reach of the skyline, unable to face Kara’s curious crinkle. “If I learned anything from my experience in the future, it’s that I don’t know of anyone else in the universe who deserves happiness more than you do, Kara.”

She paused at the unexpected sentiment. “Do you regret losing her?”

The clear ache in Kara’s voice instantly drew Cat’s full focus. She stared silently as she considered the best way to respond—and the most honest way.

Abandoning her place at the ledge, she settled instead on a spot on the balcony’s loveseat. After toeing off her Atwood _Valerie_ pumps with a satisfied sigh, she tucked her legs under her and rested her head against the hand she propped up against the back of where she sat.

From her new position, she observed Kara, waiting for her response. Her careful approach pleased Cat, who indicated with a nod that she was more than welcome to sit beside her.

Gathering her cape in one hand, Kara looped the fabric around her so she could rest it in her lap when she sat. Cat laughed at the action.

“I guess capes don’t come in wrinkle-free options.”

Kara smiled shyly while staring down at the material draped across her thighs. “This material doesn’t actually wrinkle.” She ran her fingertips over the thick pleats, her expression slowly changing to a portrait of private pain.

“It’s Kryptonian?”

Cat saw in the barely perceptible nod her segue to the conversation they both awaited.

“The first time you told me about Krypton was while we watched the sun rise over Laguna Colorada.”

The statement snapped Kara’s head back as though struck by a hard uppercut, her lips parting even before she’d sorted what she wanted to ask. Cat waited, knowing this was not a moment to be rushed.

“She—she took you there?”

Cat hummed her affirmative. “You told me how much it reminded you of Rao’s light and made you feel less alone on this planet.”

She tilted her head, golden curls brushing her neck as she did. “You told me I was the only person you had ever wanted to bring there.”

Kara looked away, her nerves alight like the air right before a lightning strike.

“Cat—”

“I promised you,” she interceded, her voice a rough sketch of itself, “that, when I came back, I would be brave for both of us—that I wouldn’t let you face another future regretting time lost and secrets kept.”

She scooted to Kara’s side, resting her hand over the hero’s familiar heartbeat.

“Every night since I returned, I’ve struggled to fall asleep without hearing this beneath my ear.”

She felt the rhythm in question increase at her confession.

“Laguna Colorada was the first place we made love—the first place I told you I loved you.”

The hero sprang from where she sat, giving Cat barely enough time to right herself before she tumbled into the now empty space beside her. Inhaling sharply from the surprise, she swept a lock of hair out of her eyes and scowled toward the hero’s new position at the far side of the balcony.

Words, however, clung to a tongue stilled at the sight of tears spilling from Kara’s eyes. Wrapping her arms tightly around her middle, she stared at Cat with wounded rage.

“I thought you might actually want me.”

Her voice barely carried across the chasm between them, weighed down by unmistakable pain.

Cat felt the disorientation of the moment in the pinch of her eyebrows. She extended her hands toward the hero in placation. “I do want you, Kara.”

“You want _her_.”

Bewilderment infused every gesture, every frown line, every furrow as Cat countered, “You _are_ her!”

Turning away with a livid flick of her cape, Kara growled, “I’m close enough for you to pretend.”

With her back to Cat, she missed the ruthless strike of her words.

“Is that what you think?”

Each wrecked syllable clanged deafeningly, even through the thunderous rush of blood in her ears. When she looked back, she saw that Cat had risen from her seat, so small in her bare feet and more fragile than Kara had ever seen her before.

“You think I’m that thoughtless? That my heart is so disloyal?”

She shook her head at the question, unnerved by Cat’s chosen wording. “Disloyal?”

Resisting the familiar internal demands to shut down, to strike back, to walk away, Cat instead crossed the balcony to stand before the bemused hero. “You asked if I regret losing the future you. What I regret is how you spent decades not knowing my true feelings for you because, here and now, I’ve been a goddamned fool.”

Once more pressing her hand against the strong beat within Kara’s chest, she avowed in a voice assertive and unwavering, “I love _you_ , Kara, and I am sorry I took that truth for granted as long as I did.”

More damning was how she had taken Kara herself for granted. She had blithely accepted an unsustainable present in which the hero always returned victorious from battle but, more importantly, always returned to _her_. She never once questioned the limits of Kara’s devotion, simply assuming it was as boundless as the rest of her extraordinary powers.

Only when she found herself thrust into the bleakness of an unanticipated future did she finally understand the cost of her hero’s perseverance in both love and battle.

She flexed her fingers against the crest of Kara’s suit. Her eyelids fluttered against memories that would always drive an ache deep into her marrow—of an impenetrable body scarred and an indomitable spirit broken.

“In the future I found myself in, you thought you had become someone not worth saving.”

She moved cautiously closer at the sound Kara’s pained gasp, combing her fingers through the hero’s long silken tresses and gently clasping her hands together against the back of her neck. Holding steady her gaze into Kara’s eyes, she promised, “If you’ll let me, I want to spend every day of the rest of my life showing you how you are worth _everything_ to me.”

The shiver of the solid body before her drew her arms down around the hero’s waist, fingers now digging into the definitions of muscle along her back. Her relief at Kara returning the embrace tripped from her lips on a tremulous sigh and she rested her head atop the strong, steady beat within her chest.

“For the record,” Kara finally replied, her voice crackling like tinder, “I love you, too.”

With a soft, amused huff, Cat shifted enough to trail kisses along the underside of Kara’s chin and up along her jawline. A pleased hum vibrated beneath her lips, spurring her further in her impromptu explorations. Hands slid across the textured patterns of Kara’s suit, recapturing intimate rhythms she had learned could stoke longing in a body once intimately familiar—now tantalizingly new.

This body was lissome and yielding, this Kara surprisingly unreserved in her responses. As Cat’s hands deftly worked their way along her hollows and curves, moans rose in rapid succession, each a delicious jolt that intensified the throbbing deep within her. Soon enough, Cat had the hero bent back against the balcony ledge, breathless and shaking with desperation, her fingers turning concrete to dust beneath their steady flex.

Struggling to surface from the fugue so easily conjured by Cat’s touches, Kara finally recaptured enough control to pant, “Wa-wait. Please.”

Cat’s hands froze in their ascent along the back of Kara’s thighs, her expression full of worry. With a quick shake of her head to dispel concern, Kara joked, “You-you definitely seem to have an unfair advantage when it comes to this.”

Penitence dulled the previous gleam of Cat’s desire-darkened gaze. Before she could pull away completely, Kara wrapped her in a hold loose but unbreakable. With another shake of her head, she continued, “I’m not upset—I promise. I just need a bit more time to catch up.”

She leaned in and tenderly kissed Cat. “I want to learn how to make you feel as good as you were just making me feel.” Glancing around with a noticeable smirk spreading across her lips, she finished, “And as much as I do love this balcony, I would like our first time together to be somewhere a bit more romantic.”

One brow rising provocatively, Cat purred, “I think making the Girl of Steel scream my name on the balcony of where I run my empire is the height of romantic.”

She softened at the sound of Kara’s responding laughter even as the hero blushed at the salacious tease. She cupped Kara’s cheek. “There will be romance, Kara. I promise.”

Glancing at her watch, she sighed in disappointed acquiescence. “I should get home now, though, to make sure Carter and his friend haven’t gotten bored with their movie marathon and decided instead to run some experiment that might blow up the penthouse—or the whole building.”

She couldn’t help leaning into the sensation of Kara’s body shifting with laughter.

“You think I’m exaggerating? I still rue the day I let him talk me into his first chemistry set.”

“I’m laughing because I know what it’s like to live with a science nerd with a penchant for randomly catastrophic experiments. Alex Danvers is my sister, remember?” She gave a theatrical shiver. “There are _stories_.”

Fingers toying with one of the pleats of Kara’s skirt, Cat replied, “I’d love to hear them. I’d love to hear all your stories.” She tilted her head inquisitively. “Does the world need Supergirl this evening?”

Kara’s brow furrowed slightly. “Alex said she wanted me to take a break tonight.” 

“Then why don’t you go home, change into something less Super, and come to the penthouse tonight?”

Perplexed, Kara stated, “But Carter’s got company.”

“Oh, I think Carter would be much more excited to introduce _you_ to his friend than me.” She patted the hero’s chest. “Besides, I think this might be more than just a _friend_.”

Kara smiled at her emphasis—smiled even more at the indulgent shine in Cat’s eyes.

“And while I have always been honest with him about my bisexuality, he’s never seen me in a relationship with a woman.”

With a huff Kara could easily intuit, she sighed, “He’s barely seen me in a relationship with anyone, including his father. I think seeing us together might help him.”

Muscles stiffened in surprise as Kara absorbed Cat’s unnervingly casual sentiment. “You want him to see us as—as _us_?”

Wanting to thwart the doubts taking root in that moment, Cat caught the hero’s gaze with unflinching fervor. “Kara, you will never be my secret, especially when it comes to my son and your part in his life.”

As the hero’s stunned silence stretched on, Cat grew increasingly worried she might have pushed her too far, too quickly. What she had not expected, however, was the startling and nearly instantaneous departure and return that settled with Kara standing before her in civilian clothes, glasses in place and Super suit fully hidden from view.

Kara smiled so brightly that Cat had to blink away the blur of her unexpected emotions. “Of course you keep clothes at the office.”

Intertwining their fingers with an ease Kara could definitely get used to, Cat slipped on her heels and led them into her private elevator. They found Cat’s driver in his usual parking spot whenever Cat decided to work late. Kara caught the way he observed the tangle of their hands, his lips ticking up at one edge as he held open the car door for both women.

The ride home passed with slow kisses and touches that promised so much more when the time was right. By the time they pulled up in front of the penthouse’s building, Cat knew she would be forever addicted to the music of Kara’s pleasure and the careful curiosity of her caresses.

Inside the penthouse, Cat called out to announce her arrival home while once more slipping off her heels as Kara did the same with her flats. Down the hall, the soft swipe of socked feet against hardwood swished to a stop as Carter slid into view.

Kara listened to the intense rhythm of his heartbeat as she noted his pink cheeks and tellingly kiss-swollen lips. Dipping her head to hide her smile, she chanced a glance over the top of her glasses. A boy, slightly shorter than Carter but similarly built with sandy blonde hair and wide brown eyes, stood just out of view in the adjoining room. He watched Carter with an expression Kara would peg as somewhere between nervous and petrified.

“M-mom? I-I thought you were working late tonight.”

He swiped the back of his hand nervously across his mouth, his forehead wrinkling as he finally registered who was with his mother. “Kara? Are you—I thought you didn’t work for my mom anymore.”

Cat stared at him with a scrutiny that clearly flustered him. “Carter, she’s always going to work for me as long as she’s at CatCo. I do own the whole company.”

Even through his nervousness, he was able to roll his eyes at his mother’s riposte. “Fine. Kara works _for_ you—but she doesn’t work _with_ you anymore.”

A startling hopefulness flickered in his widening eyes as he turned toward the hero. “Unless you’re not here for work?”

Resting a calming hand against Kara’s forearm at her soft, shocked inhalation, Cat studied her son, her lips pursing in a way he knew meant she was well aware of his thoughts on the matter at hand.

“Kara will be spending a great deal more time here for decidedly non-work reasons—if that’s all right with you.”

Beneath the casual tone, Carter caught the undercurrent of his mother’s trepidation at the possibility—no matter how miniscule—that he might protest. Face breaking into a bold, easy smile, his dark curls bounced across his forehead with his enthusiastic nod. “More than all right.”

Both Kara and Cat caught the subtle release of the tension from his shoulders as he glanced over his shoulder and gave a beckoning nod toward the adjacent room. He grinned as the young man Kara had already seen cautiously stepped into the hallway and moved to Carter’s side. As their hands instinctively found each other, Carter turned back to meet his mother’s already proud expression.

“Mom, Kara, this is Simon.” He looked again at the boy beside him, nerves fluttering his voice as he stammered, “M-my boyfriend.”

Kara’s smile, bright as the sun she thanked each morning for her powers, relaxed Simon’s still nervous stance. Beside her, Cat hummed approvingly.

Wiping his palm against his jeans as subtly as possible, he stepped forward. His voice shook but he maintained his eye contact with Cat as he extended his hand. “It’s a-a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Grant.”

With the slightest lift of her chin, she accepted his hand, pleased to feel a strong grip in response to her own. “Likewise, Simon.”

Releasing her hold, she gestured toward the woman standing beside her. “This is my girlfriend Kara.”

Were it not for Kara’s alien biology, she was certain either her legs would have given out from the shock of Cat’s introduction or she would have toppled backward from the impact of Carter throwing himself into her arms and wrapping her in a surprisingly strong hug.

As Kara quickly righted herself and fully returned his embrace, he whispered, “I’m so happy for you and my mom.”

“Me, too, buddy,” she replied, noting with a chuckle the adorable confusion on Simon’s face and the glassy-eyed adoration in Cat’s eyes.

“While you two hug it out,” the smaller blonde declared after carefully clearing her throat, “I’m going to order some pizzas.”

Her eyes narrowed as she calculated the caloric requirements of two teenage boys and a solar-powered alien. “We’ll start with ten.”

She missed the stunned expression on Simon’s face as she walked on toward the kitchen. 

That expression returned later in the evening as he watched Kara take the last piece of the fourth pizza she’d finished on her own. Beside him, Carter smiled knowingly as she popped the last bit of crust into her mouth. She recognized that look all too well, knew it meant a much deeper conversation was in store for them very soon, but was content in the moment simply to roll her eyes as she reached for a fifth pizza box.

After cleaning up, Cat and Kara cuddled contentedly together on the couch. Their attentions split between the Miyazaki marathon Carter and Simon had started earlier and watching the two teens in question as they sat close enough to share shy glances and whispers Kara made a point to block from her hearing.

When both boys had settled into sleep against each other, Cat quietly rose from Kara’s side. She retrieved two blankets from a sideboard while Kara shut off the television.

Watching Cat cover them, she offered, “You know I could carry them both to Carter’s room without waking them, right?”

Even in the darkness of the room, she could see Cat’s amusement. “As much as I appreciate the offer, I think I’d prefer if my son, his boyfriend, and their rampant teenage hormones remained in a more publicly trafficked part of the house for now.”

The smaller blonde didn’t require any form of unique vision to know how deeply Kara was blushing in that moment. “Um, y-yeah. That’s—that sounds like a good idea.”

She leaned up to brush her lips against Kara’s noticeably warm cheek. “Besides, while I’m fairly certain you wouldn’t need to give Carter any explanation, Simon would be confused as hell to find himself mysteriously transported in his sleep.” 

Without allowing Kara more time to process what she’d just confirmed about Carter’s perceptiveness, she gripped the hero’s hand and led her through the penthouse, to the balcony that wrapped around her master suite. Flicking a switch as she passed through the French doors, she settled onto the couch that curved around the now-lit fire pit.

Kara sat beside her, opening her arms with a beautifully disarming smile. Cat exhaled as she sank into Kara’s embrace.

The evening surrounded them in comfortable silence as Kara drew patterns along Cat’s back while watching the flickering dance of fire light. She refocused quickly, however, at the unexpected beckon of Cat’s voice.

“In the future, you told me Carter had a husband. They worked together to help people displaced by the Xeltari attacks.”

“Was it Simon?”

She smiled faintly at how Kara asked the same question she’d been pondering all evening. “I never asked what his husband’s name was,” she confessed. “I couldn’t bring myself to ask much of anything about either of my sons.”

Strong arms drew more tightly around her, pressing her into the warmth and security of Kara’s body.

“It’s probably for the best I didn’t find out his name,” she offered in an attempt to lessen the weight of the moment. “I think I’ve done an admirable job refraining from overbearing parenting. I’d hate to break that by launching a global search for the boy who will one day win my son’s heart.”

She heard the rumble of laughter as she rested her head against Kara’s chest.

“Tell me more about the future?”

Cat frowned at the question, bumping against Kara’s sternum as she shook her head. “It’s no longer the future, Kara. You and so many people fought incredibly hard to make certain of that. Now, it’s all just my past—where it should stay.”

At the feeling of Kara pressing her back, she sat up to make eye contact. “But it was important to you— _she_ was important.”

Cat was relieved to hear only curiosity in Kara’s voice this time, without the previous hurt. “The person I met in the future was still you, you know. Even with all you had endured, I could still find _you_.”

She cupped one of Kara’s cheeks oh so gently, her eyes burning golden green in the firelight. “I will always be able to find you.” 

Expression aglow with a happiness unrivaled, Kara leaned back on the couch, encouraging Cat to stretch out along the muscled length of her body. “And I will always do whatever it takes to keep you safe and bring you home.”

Reclining atop her hero, Cat indulged in kisses that strayed just shy of the line of decency, pleased once more by the soft serenade of Kara’s enjoyment. When she pulled back enough to take in flushed cheeks and dark gaze, she couldn’t resist the playful smile tugging at her lips.

“Tell me what you need, Cat.”

Cat had known many a lover who spoke such words with desultory indifference, offered solely to encourage a reciprocity they fully intended to accept. From Kara, it was an infrangible promise of love and devotion with expansive possibility.

She kissed Kara again, this time conveying her own pledge of love and loyalty she swore in her heart she would never betray.

As she tucked her head back against Kara’s heartbeat, she uttered words once cut from the splinters of her breaking heart, now marking the commencement of a new future for both of them. “Just hold me, Kara. Just a little while longer.”

Kara smiled as she surrounded Cat in the warmth and safety of her arms. Her expression soft and her eyes shimmering in the fire light, she whispered, “Will forever do?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, a little later than I expected--but hopefully worth it! I needed to adjust the ending a bit. I've been feeling a bit softer than usual for these two lately, and I needed the ending to reflect that. I hope you enjoyed this offering as much as I enjoyed writing it. Thank you for the excellent prompts!


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